Forget global warming - HP is well on its way to thoroughly trashing the planet by dispatching kit in the biggest box it can lay its hands on, as witnessed by our previous shock coverage of packaging outrages here, here and here.
Well, there's more. The chaps down at EduGeek last week took delivery of a fuser kit for an HP …

But it is a dedicated box!

have to give them some credit...

at least all their packaging seems to be bio-degradable or recyclable cardboard, not that 'orrible greasy white or grey "gonna outlive the universe" foam stuff tht some other manufacturers seem more than happy to use

personally id rather have an exess of cardboard than a small amount of that 'orrible foam stuff!

Sun were just as bad

I remeber ordering loads of 240s with pairs of 72GB disks. The units would turn in cardboard boxes and polystyrene. Then the disks would be in their own boxes and packing. Then the manuals would have their own boxes and bags. And finally, this was the pathetic one, the two US power adapter cables, would each have their own cardboard box! We had to order UK power cords and they would each turn up in a cardboard box!!

I'm not a massive greenie and I try to do my bit, but this was truly pathetic.

Congrats, El Reg!

Shipping Carnage

If one wants to find new and creative ways to protect the environment, one only need to look at the shipping practices of the major carriers that require cocooning tiny parts in thermonuclear blast-proof packaging.

HP is almost certainly responding to the organized carnage that passes for shipping service nowadays. My consulting company has received packages similar to what is shown above via various shipping companies (name one, they are all guilty) festively decorated with punctures, huge dents, corners ripped off, gaping holes, waterlines and, yes, even tire tracks. All too often the contents are damaged beyond repair, even with extraordinarily well-thought-out packaging.

HP, which few can argue produces generally high-quality products and services, probably considers using a 1/2 cubic meter box to send a small fuser cartridge to be an investment in customer satisfaction, not to mention a cost reduction over repeatedly replacing the same item for shipping damage or under warranty when it fails early.

Interestingly, several years ago HP sent me a fragile, cast magnesium frame rail for a laptop. Not in 32 boxes, not on a pallet, not even in a small, rigid box with packing peanuts or air pillows. They sent it in a bubble envelope. The part arrived in 3 pieces. But what was remarkable was that all three fragments could be accounted for, as there were numerous holes in the envelope. The replacement rail arrived carefully packed in bubble wrap and peanuts in an oversized box. I suspect this kind of experience was the genesis of the overpackaging trend at HP.

Been there done that

I've been on the receiving end of many of HP's packaging efforts. They are indeed marvels of obscene over packing. However I for one welcome our new air pillow and foam peanut overlords as they pursue their efforts bury us all in cardboard boxes.

Since 1980 ...

I have two stories about HP packaging, going back to about 1980. The first was a short loop of paper tape used to control form lengths in an HP printer. It was packed in a box about 5 inches square by an inch thick. That box was drowned in packing peanuts in a box the size of a large suitcase.

The second occurred when someone decided to order three pads of COBOL coding forms. We received three reams of forms, in pads. Each shrink-wrapped stack of pads was placed in a box about twice as wide, twice as long, and twice as deep as the stack, with the necessary peanuts. One of the three was then packed in a box that could fit a laundry hamper with plenty of room to spare (peanuted, of course) and the other two "small" boxes were drowned in peanuts in a box the size of a small bathup.

The bathtub-sized box and the laundry-hamper box were left outside the cramped computer room in front of the company comptroller's door. It was there that our computer operator had to go diving in the peanuts to find the contents. It was his first experience with HP packaging, and the comptroller was not amused with the styrofoam sea that clung to the trouser cuffs of everyone who entered, left, or passed his office.

The operator duly sent the shipping paperwork to accounting, who must have done something wrong with it, because the next week another pair of boxes from HP appeared, same contents, same packaging. And the week after that ...

We filled half of a high shelf to the ceiling tiles with COBOL coding forms which, as far as I know, were still there when the company moved about six years later.